Nicknamed The Great One.
Wayne Gretzky is regarded as the greatest hockey player in the history of the sport, hence the nickname.
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Few, if any, would challenge that.
Gretzky helped transform the NHL and bring it relevance amongst the four major professional sports leagues in North America.
He made hockey cool.
Gretzky played 20 seasons in the NHL, most notably for the Edmonton Oilers, from 1979–1988.
He led them to four Stanley Cup championships.
In total, Gretzky won nine Hart trophies, 10 Art Ross trophies, and four Stanley Cups.
He holds a plethora of records that seem untouchable, most notably having amassed 2,857 career points (894 goals + 1,963 assists) in 1,487 games.
That is 926 points higher than second-place, Jaromir Jagr.
Gretzky recently held the record for most career goals until Washington Capitals’ Alex Ovechkin passed him.
Over the course of his 20-year career, Gretzky amassed $46 million in earnings.
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He has since taken that near $50 million and quintupled it in size.
Gretzky currently has a reported net worth of $250 million.
He built upon his business portfolio through a series of sound investments that include stakes in various sports ownership groups, real estate ventures, restaurants, and even a vineyard.
Gretzky has held stakes in a handful of sports franchises, such as Hull Olympiques team of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League, in which he bought for $175,000 CAD in 1985.
He promptly sold them seven years later, in 1992 for $550,000 CAD.
Gretzky was a minority owner for the Toronto Argonauts of the Canadian Football League in the early 90s before once again selling for profit.
The Great One even had ownership shares in the Phoenix Coyotes and his beloved Oilers.
Both of which he has since relinquished.
The hockey legend spends his days as an analyst for TNT’s NHL coverage and can be spotted at Oilers games throughout the year.
The Canadian-born star is still very much involved in the game today.
Gretzky helped grow the game of hockey on a national level, and even at the ripe age of 64, doesn’t look to be slowing down anytime soon.
